Each dog I’ve lived with has had their own particular musical tastes. For example, my previous rescue liked early Elvis. You know, the 50’s stuff. Put on “Love Me Tender” or “Teddy Bear” and she’d walk over and put her head against the speaker. And stand there until the song ended. But play “In The Ghetto” and she’d get right up and leave the room.

I never could find anything in my musical library that Dawg enjoyed. But I was watching an NCIS rerun the other night, and they played “Ain’t No Grave” by Johnny Cash. Dawg sat up on his bed and looked at the TV. Then he cocked his head, stood up, and walked over to the set and put his nose against the screen. Finally he dropped his head down a bit, do that his ears were right in front of one of the speakers. And he stayed there until they broke for commercial. Then he came over to me, tongue lolling out, mouth in a big grin, as if to say “I want that — get me that sound.”

It was one of the last songs Johnny recorded, so his voice wasn’t as smooth or as bass as you might remember from “I Walk the Line” or “Ring of Fire”. In fact he didn’t sound too much like himself at all. But the music was all Cash. And since Dawg liked the song so much I figured I had to buy the CD just so he could listen to it. And I did.

He’s not crazy about the rest of the album, but Dawg still gets excited whenever I play that one song. So here’s for you, you weird doggie you.

Darn it Dawg — if you had to decide you liked “country”, then why couldn’t you have at least picked Willie Nelson?